Category: U.S. Foreign Policy

Mr. Warhol Predicted our Government’s Failure

This is simply a plaint, nothing you haven’t already realized yourself, indeed something I think I may have already noted here at some time in the past, but one of the perks of having a site like this is the opportunity to state the obvious when you wish to.  Although one could decry the injustice inherent in a couple of the observations made below about the complexion and standing of our early members of Congress, I don’t think anyone can dispute their accuracy.

This also the rare post that I think any American of any political persuasion across our entire spectrum would agree with.

A large share of our people are currently bemoaning the fact that our toothless Congress – some would instead characterize the members of Congress as lacking other body parts than teeth – are refusing to stand up to President Donald Trump although they – Republicans as well as Democrats – are well aware that his excesses are dangerous for our country and do little or nothing to address the issues of greatest concern to their constituents.  Instead, they cower in corners and whisper.  Why?  We’ve brought it upon ourselves with our descent into the social media snippet, reality TV, hyperbole, glitz, and Let No Complex Thought Be Left Unthought Culture.  The trouble with our Congress today is not that it is filled with people who fundamentally believe in MAGAism or Democratic Socialism, or in White Christian America or Black Lives Matter, or in Regulation or Deregulation, or in Abortion or Choice, or in Guns or No Guns, or in anything else.

They believe in Andy Warhol.

Mr. Warhol, as virtually all are aware – at least of his imputed observation, if not that it is attributed to him – was quoted by Time Magazine in 1967 as saying, “In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes.”  It doesn’t matter that it is now disputed that Mr. Warhol actually ever uttered his most famous statement, or if he did, that he was the first to say it; it will forever be attributed to him. 

What matters is the observation’s continuing resonance – much truer today than when the quote appeared in Time almost 60 years ago.  Our members of Congress need – apparently, lust for – fame.  They need everybody to know that they’re somebody.  Apparently, simply being a member of Congress makes them somebody.  That’s why we have no functioning federal legislative branch.

I will assert that the situation we have today was unfathomable for the Founding Fathers.  In a time when only white men could vote and, practically speaking, only rich white men could literally afford to donate their time – that is indeed what they were doing — to participating in the federal government, the notion that these proud landowners would totally obsequiously surrender the prerogatives of their Congressional offices to the President of the United States, or change their views to stoop to pander their constituents – the vast, vast majority of whom were incredibly poorer and incredibly less versed in the matters of the country and the world than they were — was inconceivable to them.  In the Declaration of Independence, a number had literally pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor to the founding of a new national enterprise.  They didn’t enter Congress to become somebody; each of them already was somebody.  Their sentiments upon entering Congress may be best expressed in the words of another politician in another nation at almost the same time — Irish-Anglo Edmund Burke, considered the founder of modern Conservativism (you know, the real kind), who once told his Parliament constituents that a representative’s “ … unbiased opinion, his mature judgement, his enlightened conscience, he ought not to sacrifice to you, to any man, or to any set of men living.  Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgement; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion.”

Now, we have a bunch of gutless lickspittles who pander to the basest tastes of their constituents so they can keep their tender tushies in warm cushy Congressional seats.  It is clear that the lust to keep these seats isn’t about the actual political power or purpose they provide; they have entirely ceded these to the President of their party (startlingly true right now with the particularly unscrupulous and ruthless Mr. Trump, but just as true on the other side of the political aisle when the president is a popular Democrat).  At this point, it seemingly isn’t always even about a normal citizen – one of us — being able to make him/herself a somebody by entering Congress, because it seems that more and more members of Congress already are “somebody” in the traditional sense – i.e., wealthy; so the office cannot be for the financial advantages or societal entrée it might thereafter provide.  (Actually, for our really wealthy members of Congress, it seems that the choice came down to running for Congress or buying a professional sports team, and buying a Congressional seat was cheaper and easier than buying a professional franchise.)

No, it’s as Mr. Warhol (apocryphally, at least) said:  it’s about the Fame.  “Look, look at me.  I not only need to be somebody; I need you to know I’m somebody!”  Mr. Trump is of course the most shameless example of it, but virtually all of them suffer from it.  (Oh, for the good old days when Robber Barons like John D. Rockefeller, J.P. Morgan, and Henry Ford, who were already confident that they were somebody, were satisfied to run their businesses and exploit the vast majority of Americans from behind the scenes without feeling the need to foist their views upon our citizens in public. 😉)

You want evidence?  (Although I don’t think you need it.)  It’s said today that Republican members of Congress fear Mr. Trump.  Actually, they don’t.  What they fear is his influence with their constituents – not the same.  Let’s assume for a moment that we do have free and fair elections in 2026, that current projections of a dramatic Democratic capture of the House of Representatives come to fruition, and that credible polls thereafter attribute the Republican electoral debacle to the unpopularity of the Trump Regime.  In such event, what do you want to bet that the most dangerous place to be the day after the election will be at the door of the Republican Congressional cloakroom as those Republicans who did survive rush out to find a camera to distance themselves from Mr. Trump and all that his Regime has done during its first two years? 

I know.  You won’t take the bet.

I have to admit that I used to be firmly in favor of term limits for members of Congress.  I guess I still am; but I consider it a much lesser priority than I used to.  What these people lust for isn’t power, it’s fame.  To get their seats, they all pander to whatever constituency or TV camera or media outlet that will get and keep them there.  If one leaves Congress, s/he will simply be replaced by another with the same yearning.

I don’t know how we recover a Congress with [you fill in whatever body part you consider most symbolic of inner strength].  Because in fact, our Congress is simply a reflection of what we’ve become.  

Our Congress is us.

A Greenland Checkmate – If NATO Nations Stand Fast:  a Postscript and Correction

Yesterday, it appeared that President Donald Trump and the NATO nations aligned against him over his attempts to extort Denmark, Greenland, and NATO into transferring control of Greenland to the United States were taking steps to move back from the brink of war.  Mr. Trump at one point apparently indicated that he would not attempt to use force to take control of Greenland.  Whether our Manchild President stepped back from the brink because the NATO nations found a way to placate Mr. Trump, as he claimed, or because somebody woke him up sufficiently to the possibility, as suggested in this post, that the conflict that would ensue if he ordered a military invasion of Greenland could effectively spell the end of his presidency, it does not appear – at least as this is typed – that the United States and its putative NATO allies are headed for any immediate armed conflict.

But who knows what the case will be by the time you read this?  We’ll have to see what happens today.  And then tomorrow.  And then the next day.

Meanwhile, the New York Times is reporting that the Regime’s ICE has started new operations in the state of Maine, targeting immigrants from Somalia.  Here we go again.

On a different note, I observed here recently that I very much enjoy receiving comments – even ones pointing out that I have erred in a post.  😊  I was informed yesterday by an unimpeachable source that I had erred in this original note when I casually referred to Greenland as a “colony” of Denmark.  Greenland is not a Danish colony; it is actually a self-governing territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, although Denmark handles Greenland’s foreign policy and defense, and Greenland relies heavily on Denmark’s financial support, education and health care.

The record – at least on Greenland’s legal status, and at least in these pages – is now clear.  😊

 Now, let’s brace for today’s rollercoaster ride.

A Greenland Checkmate – If NATO Nations Stand Fast

Clearly, a blizzard of impressions arise regarding the United States’ recent incursion into Venezuela, its capture and extraction of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, and what might come next.  This note isn’t about that.  (Some day, there may be a lengthy post on Venezuela that that tries your resolve and eyesight.)  That said, there is one point to be made here about the Venezuelan raid that is relevant to what follows:  President Donald Trump’s comment not long after the raid, reported by multiple credible sources, that “many” Cubans were killed in the process of capturing Mr. Maduro.  (The Cuban government later indicated that 32 Cuban military personnel were killed.) 

So much for the Cubans.  From both domestic political and geopolitical perspectives, nobody in America cares about dead Cuban soldiers.

This is about Greenland, the world’s largest island, sitting in the Western Hemisphere mostly within the Arctic Circle, a colony of Denmark – a member of NATO — since before the United States declared its independence from Great Britain.  As all who care are aware, given the Trump Regime’s repeated threats in recent weeks to capture Greenland by force if the Danes, Greenlanders, and other NATO nations are unwilling to voluntarily accede to the United States’ usurpation, some eight members of NATO have responded by stationing troops in Greenland on the professed pretext of assuring Mr. Trump that the island is safe from Mr. Trump’s expressed fears of a Russian or Chinese invasion (a completely fabricated concern; Vladimir Putin has his hands full in Ukraine and Xi Jinping is eyeing Taiwan; neither has imminent plans to invade a NATO territory now significantly less strategic to him), while clearly signaling their intent to militarily resist any assault on Greenland by American troops.  Today, Mr. Trump will be in Davos, Switzerland, at the world’s most renowned annual meeting of political and financial bigwigs.  If credible reporting is accurate, Mr. Trump plans to pressure NATO leaders to enable him to assume control of Greenland.

Make no mistake.  I remain a foreign policy disciple of Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, and there is a lot to be said about securing Greenland’s strategic position for all of NATO as well for the United States in areas such as missile paths, emerging commercial waterways, and rare earth minerals, most of which you already know, much and perhaps all of which could be achieved through deft diplomacy.  There is also a lot to say about Mr. Trump’s increasing erraticism and seeming detachment from reality as he completes the first year of his second term (there does seem to be something that’s changed in the President’s behavior in the last several months – even by the standards we judge him — beyond his aging reversion), but perhaps we’ll get back to that in a future post.  The focus here is on the impending – and extraordinarily silly, if the matter wasn’t so serious — military crisis brought about by the Regime’s thuggish, blatantly illegal approach to wrest control of Greenland from Denmark.  I was initially frustrated by the NATO nations’ response to the Regime’s bellicose overtures – to the effect that aggressive action by the Regime “would mean the end of NATO” – because such tepid responses seemed to indicate an obliviousness to the reality that Mr. Trump wants to destroy NATO, and to invite a Greenland assault would provide him a way to do so.  I have since been incredibly encouraged by the NATO nations’ stationing of troops in Greenland.  The question now is whether the NATO leaders have the internal fortitude to stand up to Mr. Trump’s formidable personal pressure.  If they do, I would submit that no matter how outraged Mr. Trump may be – unless he is now truly delusional, which one can no longer rule out – he will see that he has been checkmated.

The bulk of this note addresses somewhat antiseptically the domestic political ramifications Mr. Trump may face if he orders a military assault on Greenland – how such an order might affect him, which is all he cares about.  What can’t be ignored at the outset are the moral, legal, and potentially tragic personal consequences of what would be a deranged order to invade the island:  Denmark and Greenland control Greenland.  They have for centuries.  We don’t.  We’ve offered to take control of the island.  (If they were willing, I’d support it.)  They’ve said no.  There is no legal or moral gray area.  In a civilized world, that is the end of the story.  As to the potential personal consequences:  As the NATO nations with troops in Greenland make clear their readiness to confront any offensive American assault, I am outraged and terrified for the American troops and for the NATO troops — who have each sworn to serve their nations and NATO as a whole – whose lives may be forfeit, as was National Guardsman U.S. Army Specialist Sarah Beckstrom’s to a Trump Regime publicity stunt, to Mr. Trump’s attempt to fulfill a totalitarian vision of hemispheric conquest which can no longer be distinguished from the Nazis’ 1930s claims of their need for Lebensraum (“Living  Space”).  (Don’t forget the President’s ongoing references to Canada, and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s current spirited defense of Greenland.  Mr. Carney clearly recognizes that if Greenland falls – I deliberately use a wartime battle reference – Canada is next.)

Credible polls indicate that an overwhelming majority of Americans – including an unusually notable segment of Mr. Trump’s hardcore base — think his designs on Greenland are completely unwarranted.  Although many of these Americans may not have cared about dead Cubans, and may not understand the importance of preserving NATO for America’s security, I would submit that they will care about dead Danes, dead Canadians, dead Brits, dead French, dead Germans, dead Swedes, dead Finns, and dead Norwegians (I may be leaving a nation out; if so, I apologize) if we launch a military assault against an ally when we are so clearly in the wrong.    

And much more than that:  they will most certainly will care about dead Americans.  NATO troops know how to shoot.  I suspect that in the Greenland meetings taking place this week, one or more of the NATO leaders will make it clear to Mr. Trump — make it, as they say, crystal:  If the United States makes an aggressive incursion into Greenland, there will be dead Americans.

A second factor with which Mr. Trump should be considering when pondering his malign invasion:  that Congressional Democrats’ recent video reminding American military personnel about their obligation to disregard illegal orders, taken together with the Regime’s vitriolic counterattacks against those members, have made every U.S. service member acutely aware of his/her oath to disregard illegal orders.  Any order to invade Greenland – an ally — will place all American troops, from commander to grunt, in a grotesquely unjust ethical quandary.  If Mr. Trump orders the invasion, how many will demur?  Aside from the troops’ dilemma, Mr. Trump should realize from his own self-interest – again, all he cares about — that if he loses command of the military, his presidency is effectively emasculated.

The first dead American in Greenland – and perhaps even the first dead NATO soldier – will not only mean the end of NATO; I will venture that it will mean the end of Mr. Trump’s presidency (although it may be the beginning of his dictatorship).  Some Americans will reflexively jump to an “America, Right or Wrong” stance; I submit that the a vast majority will not.  The domestic paroxysm resulting from a Greenland invasion added to the continuing protests related to Renee Good’s killing and ICE’s brutal immigration enforcement activities will inflame protests and violent skirmishes across this country.

Unless Mr. Trump is willing to go the final mile – declare Martial Law, and declare himself a de facto dictator (again, assuming that the American military will even follow him) — a united NATO front in Davos will effectively checkmate his designs in Greenland.  I understand the NATO leaders’ continuous coddling of this President Manchild; they have seen it as their best approach to ensure that he continues to provide his lukewarm assistance to their efforts to support Ukraine.  That said – and I suspect that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy would agree – no amount of appeasement will deter Mr. Trump from abandoning NATO and Ukraine if he gets it in his head to do so, and NATO leaders’ obsequiousness regarding Greenland is at least as likely to encourage Mr. Trump’s arbitrary abandonment of Ukraine as deter it.  I would further venture that Mr. Trump’s tariff threats against these NATO nations are strategically toothless.  He can tariff these NATO nations all he wants; but for a very brief respite in the 1990s through the early 2000s, they have lived under the threat of Nazi and then Soviet/Russian aggression since 1933.  Given principles of sovereignty and democracy as fundamental as exist here, tariffs are not going to cow them.  (Any Supreme Court decision hereafter holding that Mr. Trump cannot use tariffs to effect his whimsical non-economic initiatives will obviously sharpen an impending Constitutional crisis.)  Politically, these democratic NATO leaders can blame America for their citizens’ ensuing economic hardships, and their citizens will support them.

In the last months, I have obviously made a number of provocative comparisons between the designs and actions of the Trump Regime and past autocratic regimes, mostly in reference to the Regime’s ICE forces’ immigration enforcement measures.  It is clear that the Regime’s autocratic inclinations do not stop within our borders.  Although I could cite a dozen of Mr. Trump’s own comments to make the point, instead I’ll quote comments about Greenland made by Deputy White House Chief of Staff Stephen Miller a couple of weeks ago.  As all who care are already aware, Mr. Miller, who wields tremendous influence in the White House, said the following in an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper:

“Nobody’s going to fight the United States militarily over the future of Greenland. … We live in a world, in the real world, Jake, that is governed by strength, that is governed by force, that is governed by power.  These are the iron laws of the world since the beginning of time.”

Compare that to the following:

“In this case we must not let political boundaries obscure for us the boundaries of eternal justice.  … [L]et us be given the soil we need for our livelihood.  True, [the nations possessing the land we covet] will not willing do this.  But then the law of self-preservation goes into effect; and what is refused to amicable methods, it is up to the fist to take.”

Who do you think said that?  (I know; I made it too easy.)

  • Adolf Hitler; Mein Kampf, Vol I, Ch. IV

In an earlier note, I commented that there was a lot to unpack in the Greenland situation; I was referring to the various substantive geopolitical issues related to the island.  In the context in which we are now speaking, there is very little to unpack:  there is right, and there is wrong.  My use of the checkmate analogy in this note is also arguably inapposite:  chess is an intellectual, antiseptic exercise; a player readily sacrifices pawns to win the game.  What we are facing here is not antiseptic.  It is about sovereignty and the rule of law.  It is about the potential sacrifice of innocent lives.  If Mr. Trump comes to understand this week that forces are resolutely arrayed against him, may he have enough remaining sense of reason – I have no illusions that he has any sense of humanity – to stand down.

We’ll see what happens.

The Year of Decision Ahead

No, this will not be our year of decision.  We had our year of decision in 2024, and it appears tenable to maintain, based upon recent credible polls setting forth our citizens’ collective assessment of President Donald Trump’s performance in what has essentially been the first full year of his second term, that a solid majority of us — including a notable segment of lukewarm Trump voters who believed that he would improve their financial circumstances and be judicious in his immigration enforcement – is currently of the persuasion that we fu… er … fouled up.  Knowing what we as a people know today, if a presidential election was held tomorrow, I’m not sure that former Vice President Kamala Harris would beat Mr. Trump – I fear that the prejudices of some against a female candidate of color might, despite everything, still be too strong – but I’d wager that former President Joe Biden would win — that faced with the stark choice of selecting a president either unnervingly infirm or capriciously malevolent, a majority of Americans in the swing states would prefer a grandfather figurehead to what we’ve wrought.  But let’s start with the image I consider the best depiction of what I consider Mr. Trump and his regime to have done to America’s democracy at home and standing around the world during 2025; we’ll talk about what 2026 might hold on the other side.

Batman (1989): Joker Museum Scene

So … on to 2026.  I am not going to try your eyesight by repeating a litany of pontifications I have made before; let’s just look at the record.  Suffice it to say that if, as I believe, it is beyond Mr. Trump’s capacity to radically change his direction in the coming year, we will see more untoward monarchial ostentatiousness and self-aggrandizement, continued blatant disregard for and failure to address the financial stresses of about 80% of Americans (including millions of Trump supporters) (as overall American economic indicators and the financial markets rise, and the fortunes of the top financially secure 20% of Americans continue to multiply), continued brutally-indiscriminate immigration enforcement, continued blatant failure to meaningfully address healthcare access and healthcare cost concerns for millions of Americans (the majority of whom are Trump supporters), continued claims that Americans’ troubles are caused by something President Barack Obama did in 2009 or Mr. Biden did in 2021, continued rigid adherence to unpopular tariff policies and pressure for lower interest rates (which will seemingly collectively increase inflationary pressures on the 80% who are most adversely affected by it), continued purging of federal expertise and resources that it took us over a century to build, continued denial of scientific realities such as vaccine therapies and climate change (leading to outbreaks of diseases seemingly vanquished decades ago and once-in-a-century environmental disasters now occurring annually 😉), increased efforts to manipulate federal statistics that reflect badly on the Administration, increased deployment of National Guard and active U.S. military to locations of increased demonstrations against Administration policies, continued concessions to Middle East nations whose leaders ensure that the Trump Family’s personal financial coffers are enriched, continued erratic foreign policy forays (offending at the same time those Americans who believe in a strategic American foreign policy, and his isolationist MAGA supporters), continued transparent attempts to abandon NATO and Ukraine to Russia (at the same time thereby emboldening acquisitive dictators, offending allies upon whom we rely to aid our defense, those of us at home who believe in a strategic American world presence, and – wait for it – even his isolationist MAGA supporters, whom polls show nonetheless overwhelmingly hate Vladimir Putin), continued pursuit of criminal prosecutions against those he considers his political enemies, continued demonization of those he perceives as his opponents and/or unacceptably unclean (i.e., anybody not white, Christian, and sexually straight) and merciless retribution on those, no matter how previously slavishly supportive of him, whom the President of the United States perceives as being becoming insufficiently loyal.

I know, I know.  Did I really have to remind you?  Didn’t many of us just get done singing, “Silent Night”?

By this time, I’m sure you’ve already thought of several I’ve overlooked.

At one level, you’ve got to give the Bugger credit.  He’s accomplished a lot in a year, hasn’t he?

Let’s look forward. 

In response to my inquiry, the now ever-present “AI Overview” indicates that since 1980, a sitting president’s party has lost an average of 20 seats in the House of Representatives in the midterm elections following his inauguration.  In 2010, the first midterm after Mr. Obama’s inauguration, Democrats lost over 50; in 2018, the first midterm after Mr. Trump’s first inauguration, Republicans lost over 40.  In our increasingly gerrymandered and hyper-toxic political climate – and because I believe that Mr. Trump’s popularity won’t sink much lower; it’s already about down to its unshakeable, rock-hard foundation — it is hard to believe that Republicans will lose as many House seats as they did in 2018.  I have seen credible commentators indicate that House Republicans themselves currently – a huge qualifier – consider 15 to 25 of their members at serious risk of defeat.  At least under the way American democracy has traditionally worked, if Democrats do grasp firm command of the House in 2027, for the last two years of the President’s term they will have the opportunity to politically neutralize him and his minions by passing populist measures that the Administration will reject; if Mr. Trump comes to be seen both as a lame duck generally and a political albatross for Congressional Republicans, they will magically transform from figurative lemmings (who in reality have more sense than they’re given credit for) to rats (who are indeed savvy survivors) fleeing a sinking ship.  (Of course, this is assuming that Congressional Democrats have the political skill to effectively exploit any leverage they acquire.  You can take that one.)

[An aside:  in a note a while back on the most recent NO KINGS rallies, I indicated that Republican U.S. WI Rep. Brian Steil, who represents the Wisconsin First Congressional District, won his 2024 race by 2 points, and suggested that Mr. Steil was clearly politically endangered if there was indeed a “Democratic Wave” in 2026. When looking at the statistics from Mr. Steil’s race, I clearly read the wrong column; he won by 12 points in 2024.  One has to assume that the Democratic Wave would have to be a tsunami for him to lose his seat.  On the other hand, his Republican colleague, U.S. WI Rep. Derrick Van Orden representing the Wisconsin Third Congressional District, did, as I indicated in that same note, win his seat by about 3 points in 2024, and must be feeling a little uneasy at present.]

All that said, we’re back to the First Negotiation Strategy Commandment:  Always assume that the other guy (in a genderless sense) is at least as bright as you are, and knows at least as much about the given circumstances as you do.

Mr. Trump and his people can read polls.  That’s why at least the initial pivotal decisions next year will be theirs, not ours.  The President’s advisors could attempt to correct course — try to get Mr. Trump to act less … Trump-like.  (There is an eon of time before the midterms, as the late Marquette University Basketball Coach Al McGuire might say; President George H. W. Bush’s popularity was over 50% exactly one year before the 1992 election, and he still lost.  Popularity can just as readily go up as down.)  I am pretty sure that they are too smart for that.  Although Mr. Trump could be saved from his ways in spite of himself – e.g., the economy could inexplicably improve for the financially stressed 80%, or he could get credit for reducing Americans healthcare concerns because enough House Republicans, to save their own political skins and despite Mr. Trump, work with House Democrats to restore Affordable Care Act subsidies — it is blatantly obvious to all with the IQ of a rock that Mr. Trump is viscerally incapable of changing his ways.  So unless Mr. Trump receives unexpected political gifts that he doesn’t himself earn, one can seemingly confidently assume that the President’s advisors recognize that if they hope to stave off a Democratic House takeover in 2027, they will need to go on the offensive with division, distraction, intimidation, and lies:

  • Assume that there will be fears expressed in each of the districts currently represented by politically imperiled Congressional Republicans that a male highschooler transitioning to female is considering joining their girls high school basketball team.  It won’t matter that the young person may have no more interest in hitting nor ability to hit a free throw than I do.
  • Assume that the Haitians in Springfield, OH, will be claimed to be resuming their diet of cats and dogs, joined by Somalis in Minneapolis.
  • Assume that mountains of federal largesse will suddenly be voted by the Republican Congress for these imperiled Republicans’ districts.
  • Assume that every murder in a “Blue City” will be reported endlessly in alt-right media following the event – the more heinous the act, the longer the coverage.  They’ll get bonus points if the murder is committed by an immigrant or a person of color.
  • Assume that unprecedented amounts of campaign contributions will shower upon these 25 districts.
  • Assume an exponential increase of baseless claims of potential voter fraud.
  • Assume an aggressive effort to purge certain liberal-profile voters from critical districts’ registered rolls.
  • Assume unprecedented voter intimidation tactics; specifically, assume that ICE will make clear its intent to be in as close a proximity to polling places of heavily Latino swing districts as the law will allow – and that ICE will be stopping all of Latin descent to check their identifications as they attempt to enter and/or exit the polling place perimeter.
  • Assume lawsuits seeking to limit the times and places that voters can cast their ballots.
  • Assume that those who follow alt-right media will continue to live in their own alternate reality.  We have Fox News Channel on our cable package.  Although I can’t stomach it, TLOML will occasionally switch over when CNN is broadcasting an event or major story which tends to reflect badly on the Regime.  Fox is NEVER covering it, at least while she is tuned in. 

If as of the beginning of October, 2026, credible polls indicate that the above and like efforts seem unlikely to prevent a Democratic takeover of the House of Representatives, expect:

  • An October surprise.  It could involve foreign policy, but more likely a bribe like a $250 “Trump 250Th Bonus” to every American.
  • That the Regime will at least consider establishing a pretext to declare Martial Law and suspend elections.

Expecting a more comforting message as we begin the New Year?  In what I hope is one of the few areas I share with Mr. Trump, you can’t say that I didn’t let you know what I was thinking.  😉 The religious days of the Holidays are over.  The maxim, “Forewarned is forearmed,” is so common that it isn’t even attributed to anybody.  (I actually checked.)  While I have faith that the Almighty has provided many ways to achieve tranquility in the next life, I would submit that He (using a male pronoun for a genderless being) leaves it up to us to maintain – always peacefully — our tranquility in this one (although I do have faith that He’ll give us a little help if we ask for it 😊).  Fortunately, as citizens of the United States of America, we still retain peaceful means to maintain the rights that the Founding Fathers envisioned for us a quarter of a millennium ago.  I do believe that Americans who embrace the message of Thomas Jefferson – that all of us of every persuasion should have an equal opportunity to have a say in our nation’s future, and contribute to and be part of the promise of America – can make a comeback this year.  So be ready for anything, and make your voice heard throughout the coming year.  I do believe that such will make a difference – if in no other way, through the reinforcement of others.  There is strength in numbers. 

So maybe we do have decisions to make about what we do this year, after all.  There is comfort in that. 

Happy New Year.

On the National Guardsmen Shooting and Its Aftermath

[Note:  “Guardsmen” is considered a gender-neutral term by the military, and will be so used here.]

With all of the recent controversy regarding the Trump Administration’s repeated striking of an allegedly drug-running boat in the South Caribbean Sea on September 2, the shootings of National Guardsmen U.S. Army Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24, in Washington, D.C. on the day before Thanksgiving have more or less dropped off the news feeds I see.  All are aware that Specialist Beckstrom has died.  As this is typed, Sgt. Wolfe is reportedly improving despite grievous wounds. 

I haven’t forgotten.  These shootings continue to resonate with me with a force that I now generally only feel as deeply – a sad reflection of the desensitization seeping into me in our violence-riven society — when hearing of school shootings.

But I’m not only heartbroken.  I’m livid.

Because it was so unnecessary.  Guardsmen Beckstrom and Wolfe didn’t have to be there.  They could have been home celebrating Thanksgiving with their families.

I consider two men responsible for their deaths:  Afghani Refugee Rahmanullah Lakanwal; and President Donald Trump.

Make no mistake:  Mr. Lakanwal – given the apparently indisputable evidence that he was the perpetrator — pulled the trigger.  It makes no difference that he may have saved American lives through his service in Afghanistan, or that he and some similarly-situated Afghanis may not have received as much federal assimilation assistance upon arrival here as might have been preferable, or that he fell prey to radicalization after arriving in this country, or noting any other explanation some rationalizer might attempt to dream up.  He killed Specialist Beckstrom.  He irrevocably altered Sgt. Wolfe’s life.  Assuming that he is found guilty of the shootings after a fair trial according him all the rights to which he is entitled under the United States Constitution, Mr. Lakanwal deserves whatever sentence he receives; if the death penalty is legally rendered, I won’t lose any sleep over it.

That said, I was surprised to see Administration officials so quickly embrace the phrase, “targeted shooting,” to describe Mr. Lakanwal’s act – not because it wasn’t accurate, but because it so clearly was – and as such, a damning indictment of Mr. Trump.  Under any reasonable assessment, National Guardsmen – tragically for them, in the persons of Ms. Beckstrom and Mr. Wolfe – were Mr. Lakanwal’s targets.  Given the President’s ballyhooed deployment of National Guard to our nation’s capital, media reports of the areas they patrolled, and some simple reconnaissance, any unbalanced individual with much less than Mr. Lakanwal’s military background could easily project when and where Guardsmen would be.  These two Guardsmen, walking at midday on a highly-traveled city street blocks from the White House with no indication of imminent danger, were no match for someone with Mr. Lakanwal’s training and experience. 

Mr. Lakanwal simply shot the targets set up for him by Donald Trump.       

Too harsh, you say?  Consider the untaken alternatives:  Mr. Lakanwal undoubtedly had hundreds of people in sight between the time he set out that day and the time he opened fire on the Guardsmen.  One might surmise that at some point before the incident he had one or more D.C. police officers within easy range, who would have been no more prepared for his sudden assault than the Guardsmen were.  He passed them all up to target members of the American military — who were only on that street because they were ordered to take part in what the Trump Administration has called “a crackdown on crime” – i.e., to participate in a quintessentially local law enforcement activity outside their traditional mission as part of an Administration public relations stunt which obviously has as its primary purposes the intimidation of its political opponents and scoring propaganda points with its gullible MAGA base.

So, what of this sacrifice of these two young people who had volunteered to serve their country?

Well, that’s Show Biz.

I would wager that in stationing Guardsmen in “Blue Cities” – largely against the wishes of local officials — Mr. Trump has been hoping for an incident in which cameras caught protestors behaving aggressively toward Guardsmen.  I do not believe that he wanted or intended as tragic a result as has occurred – any more than a tavern patron who has had too many drinks wants or intends any automobile accident deaths that s/he ultimately causes – but anyone with the sense God gave a goose could anticipate that what did happen, might happen.  In fact, on November 26th, the New York Times quoted a California National Guardsman indicating, “he and his commanders worried that [their assignment to patrol Los Angeles] ‘increased our risk of us shooting civilians or civilians taking shots at us.’”  In the same piece, the Times recorded that last August, Guard commanders involved in its Capital deployments issued communications “… warn[ng] that troops were in a ‘heightened threat environment’ … that ‘nefarious threat actors engaging in grievance based violence, and those inspired by foreign terrorist organizations’ might view the mission ‘as a target of opportunity’ … and that the mission ‘presents an opportunity for criminals, violent extremists, issue motivated groups and lone actors to advance their interests.’”  The inherent risk was blatantly obvious.  The President and his cohort just didn’t, and don’t, give a damn.

In the days after the incident, I saw reports indicating:

Item:  Trump Administration claimed that Mr. Lakanwal was never vetted by the Biden Administration before being allowed to enter the country.  This has now been debunked by so many sources – including sources that indicate that Mr. Lakanwal’s latest clearance came this spring, from the Trump Administration – that I don’t know if the Regime is still spouting this; of course, anything is possible from an organization that loudly continued to repeat a uniformly-debunked lie about Springfield, OH, Haitian immigrants eating cats and dogs.

Item:  The Trump Administration has halted the processing of immigration requests from anyone from Afghanistan.  It’s not unreasonable to assume that many of these applicants are seeking refuge after aiding our efforts against the Taliban.  I have seen reports that since returning to power, the Taliban has brutally persecuted those Afghanis suspected of assisting us.  The Trump Administration halt is a monstrous overreaction to the evil act of one radicalized Afghani, which could well have fatal consequences for thousands of our Afghani associates ultimately abandoned as an outcome of a wrongheaded withdrawal agreement negotiated by the first Trump Administration.     

Item:  The Trump administration vowed to conduct a sweeping re-examination of “every Green Card” held not only by all Afghanis already admitted to our country but also those held by nationals from almost a score of other Middle Eastern, African and South American countries which the Regime has subjected to a travel ban.  I know – I’m wasting my typing and your eyesight to point out that there is no logical link between a tragically-radicalized Afghani and thousands of other immigrants from across the world legally here under other programs.  Given the “Ready, Fire, Aim,” Nazi Sturmabteilung approach the Regime has taken to immigration enforcement, perhaps thousands of unquestionably innocent people will be caught up in this surge.  To state the obvious:  if it proceeds with such an examination, the Regime will simply have used this incident as a pretext for indulging its racial, religious, and political biases.

Item:  That the Trump Administration is looking into the possibility of deporting Mr. Lakanwal’s family.  (Any competent criminal investigation will certainly explore whether others were aware of or complicit in Mr. Lakanwal’s act.  If there is evidence of others’ culpability, either within or outside Mr. Lakanwal’s family, those whose guilt can be established should be criminally tried and appropriately sentenced, not deported.)  Absent sufficient evidence of culpability of specific members of Mr. Lakanwal’s family members, deporting the innocents as a consequence of this incident is every bit as conceptually constitutionally sound as, say … holding Mr. Trump’s wife and children liable for the $88 million he owes E. Jean Carroll for sexual assault and defamation.

These measures, if carried out, smack of fascism – demonizing “others” for political gain with literally no factual foundation.

Are we done?  Not quite yet.  Let’s consider a potentially even more dire consequence of the assault upon Guardsmen Beckstrom and Wolfe:  that patrolling Guardsmen begin to view those walking around them as potential enemies – an approach necessary in foreign war zones, but frighteningly fraught on American soil (while at the same time seemingly becoming understandable).  (If you were a Guardsman, wouldn’t this incident make you view those moving around you with greater suspicion?)  Recall that the Times piece cited above quoted a Guardsman observing that the deployments increased the “risk of us shooting civilians.”     

Let’s end this overly-long rant with the most idiotic irony:  Mr. Trump’s announcement that given the shooting, he intends to deploy an additional 500 National Guardsmen to D.C.  One just has to sit back, pause, and blink before continuing.  As noted above, the pretext for this Administration grandstand is a “crackdown” on what let’s call, for purposes of this note, “commonplace” crime in D.C.  If the shooting of Guardsmen Beckstrom and Wolfe was indeed a shooting targeted at U.S. military – a rare point of agreement between the Noise and the Regime – it wasn’t even the type of “crime” that the deployment was intended to address.  Not only that:  I have seen reports that prior to embarking on his mission, Mr. Lakanwal was living in Washington state, not D.C. – so he could not conceivably even have been among the D.C. criminal element that Mr. Trump was intending to confront through the deployment.  If Guardsmen hadn’t been in D.C., there certainly wouldn’t have been as many or arguably as vulnerable military targets in the city as Mr. Trump’s order provided to Mr. Lakanwal.  Because of the President’s order, Guardsmen Beckstrom and Wolfe were in place to be shot while taking part in maneuvers beyond the proper military purview by a malign operator who wasn’t covered by the Regime’s expressed mission.  So, explain to me the logic of adding 500 additional targets to an already target-rich environment for deranged individuals in our gun-obsessed environment because of a heinous incident that wasn’t within the mission’s scope committed by somebody who wasn’t from D.C.

On the day they were shot, Ms. Beckstrom and Mr. Wolfe’s ages averaged to 22 – which, in turn, is only half of the average age of our three children.  These two young victims enlisted to serve their country – something I never did.  They had their whole lives in front of them.  They deserved a Commander in Chief worthy of them.  Theirs, and perhaps the lives of thousands of innocent immigrants, have been irrevocably altered — in sacrifice to a propaganda stunt. 

There is an episode of The West Wing in which Martin Sheen’s fictional President Bartlet makes a wrong decision, and a number of U.S. service members are killed as a result.  The episode – among the most poignant in a series that all who read these notes know that I consider the best television program in history – ends with Mr. Sheen’s Bartlet standing on the tarmac at the military airport where the deceased service members’ bodies have been flown back to the states.  Mr. Sheen is a great actor, and even without seeing the episode one can imagine the agony he shows as Bartlet as the caskets, draped in flags, are solemnly marched, one by one, by pristinely-uniformed, white-gloved honor guards, from the aircraft to where the President stands, with a brief pause in front of him, and then moved to a waiting inner chamber.

Mr. Trump is a father.  I wonder:  Does he ever think about the damage and destruction he has done to so many lives and careers with his deranged, malicious, shock-jock, made-for-TV machinations?  In what is probably the most awful suggestion I have ever made about Mr. Trump in all the years I have been posting in these pages:  He doesn’t.      

I pray that Specialist Beckstrom can rest in peace.

On Blowing Up Boats

What with Holiday preparations, general affairs (we’ve had A LOT of snow early in the winter in Madison), and working on another, still-unfinished post, I haven’t previously expounded – perhaps “ranted” would be a more apt description — on President Donald Trump’s Administration’s blowing up of allegedly drug-running boats in international waters.  What has caused me to take your time here is an observation that seems to me to be the most critical facet – and potentially the most supportive aspect for the preservation of our democracy – of the possible ramifications of the Regime’s launching of four strikes on a boat on September 2, 2025.  (I believe that it is undisputed that two occupants of the boat survived the first strike, but were killed in the second.  Two subsequent strikes – apparently to completely obliterate the vessel itself – followed.)  I feel it is appropriate to note that potentially supportive aspect here because it occurred to me before I saw any media commentator make it.

However, let’s first – as a client of mine used to say decades ago when reviewing the progress of an ongoing negotiation – review the bidding regarding these operations.

The Administration claims that its actions are justified because we are at “war” with “narco-terrorists.”  Note how skillfully Mr. Trump and his minions have moved the goal posts:  it seems that the majority of commentators feel obligated to start their commentaries regarding these actions with the proviso, “assuming we are at war.”  These talking heads might as well say, “Well, assuming Siamese cats are tigers …”  The Administration’s whole premise is absurd.  [The justification for the last two strikes on the boat on September 2 makes one blink:  “We had to make sure that the boat could no longer be used [as an instrument of war] against us.”  What?  Relative to our U.S. Naval strength, the boat was a canoe.  This is akin to calling a contest between the Los Angeles Dodgers and a West Madison Little League team, “a baseball game.”  We are not at war.   

Next.  The United States certainly has the right to use legitimate means to limit illicit drug smuggling into our country.  These Regime activities glaringly fail the legitimacy test.  First, as far as I know, no satisfactory evidence has been given that any specific struck boat was actually carrying drugs.  One of the primary premises of this nation is the presumption of innocence until proven guilty.  Where did that go?  U.S. KY Sen. Rand Paul has noted statistics indicating that over the years our U.S. Coast Guard interceptions of suspected trafficking vessels have failed to discover drugs 25% of the time – from which one could infer that perhaps 20 of the 80 killed in these strikes have been innocent.  [I heard one pundit suggest a particularly sad nuance:  that cartels may be requiring otherwise law-abiding individuals to undertake drug runs upon threat that their loved ones will otherwise be tortured or killed.  (Such a scenario seems increasingly credible given the cartels’ now-understandable concern about the risk that the Regime’s actions pose to their personnel.)  Although these coerced individuals would, if apprehended, be guilty of drug smuggling, under such pressure either you or I would undertake these missions.]  Second, subject to your correction, I do not believe that drug trafficking offenses are generally characterized as capital crimes under U.S. law.  Mr. Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth are bullies who clearly just enjoy beating up on the weak and pandering their manhood to the gullible MAGA base.  Whether those operating these struck boats have been guilty or innocent, with every strike the Regime is arguably in violation of international law.

Let’s step back a minute.  I can’t resist.

As all who care are aware, in November six Congressional Democrats with military or national security backgrounds released a video in which they advised our current members of the military that they had the right to disobey “unlawful orders.”  Mr. Trump quickly fired back with posts on his social network proclaiming that the members’ behavior was “seditious behavior, punishable by death,” indicated that these members should be arrested and tried, and forwarded a post asserting that the members should be hanged.  Aside from the fact that Mr. Trump’s accusations were wholly baseless, the depth of irony of such declarations, coming from a man who lied about losing an election and incited a seditious attack on our nation’s Capitol, is literally nauseating.

As this is typed, Messrs. Trump and Hegseth are in the process of shifting all of the responsibility for the second strike on the boat in the September 2 incident — the strike that killed the two individuals who survived the first strike – to Adm. Frank Bradley (who is currently reported to have ordered the second strike after Mr. Hegseth, apparently undisputedly, had given the order to “Kill Them All” before the first strike) – while disingenuously appearing to support the Admiral’s action.  Such is obviously a despicable abdication of responsibility.  Former President Harry Truman – who coined our most pithy, well-known description of presidential responsibility, “The Buck Stops Here” – must be rolling over in his grave.  (Of course, Mr. Truman, a man of rectitude, has probably already figuratively drilled at least halfway to China beneath his gravestone throughout the Trump presidencies; this latest outrage has probably just made him spin a little faster.)

I haven’t done any research on Adm. Bradley; I have no idea whether he was by nature a willing participant in this operation or merely acting as a reluctantly-obedient subordinate when he ordered the second strike (if he indeed did).  If there is any substance to the opinions being voiced by military legal experts seemingly across the political media spectrum – and even accepting the baseless premise that we are at war with drug cartels (see; even I’m doing it 😉) – there may well be grounds warranting the Admiral’s placement under court martial for a war crime (as well as the personnel who actually executed the strike).  A vital reminder:  all the evidence is almost certainly not yet in, and the Admiral is scheduled to meet with members of Congress today in confidential sessions.  That said, if he and his involved subordinates do suffer severe consequences for the actions they took on September 2 – while at the same time the Trump Administration seeks to exonerate Mr. Hegseth and distance Mr. Trump from the incident – I would submit that the incident potentially provides a silver – nay, gold – lining for the preservation of our democracy:  by their unscrupulous, gutless behavior, Messrs. Trump and Hegseth will have alienated the entire American military.

If in the future Mr. Trump or Mr. Hegseth orders military personnel to move against peaceful American protestors – recall that Mark Esper, the last Secretary of Defense in the first Trump Administration, related in his memoir, A Sacred Oath, that when demonstrators protested in Washington, D.C., after the murder of George Floyd, Mr. Trump asked authorities, “Can’t you just shoot them? Just shoot them in the legs or something?” — do you think they’ll obey the order?  Would you?

The most instructive aspect of this incident will be how Mr. Trump reacts.  It was clear from the day Mr. Trump nominated Mr. Hegseth that he was an atrociously stupid choice as Secretary of Defense.  However, when challenged, the President ALWAYS doubles down, considers admission of mistake an indication of weakness, pushes through – and with his core supporters, it has worked for the last decade.  I wonder how such an approach will work with the military, which has maintained a fiercely nonpartisan tradition – while being acutely aware of its own position and prerogatives –throughout this country’s existence.  I was never in the military, so anything I venture is obviously the broadest speculation; but one can question how much support Mr. Trump will retain with the military if he reflexively clings to and protects Mr. Hegseth.

You can’t be a dictator without controlling your citizenry.  You can’t control your citizenry without a military that obeys you.

I am well aware that my notes of optimism in recent posts are no more than slivers of reassurance in an era of tragedy.  Still, they’re better than nothing.

Stay well – and for those in the north, stay warm.   😊

The Race is On

“The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.”

  • Chinese General and Philosopher Sun Tzu (544 BC – 496 BC); The Art of War

I think we can confidently assume that President Donald Trump has never heard of Sun Tzu, but I would venture that a number of his strategists have.

The race to preserve the American way of life is beginning in earnest.

I have mentioned a couple of times in these pages since Mr. Trump was reelected that I presumed that Mr. Trump and his adherents recognized that on their best day, they only had the support of half of the American public, and understood that they needed to employ the Nazi model of the 1930s to quickly consolidate their control of our country if they were going to be able to reshape it to their vision.  They have certainly done so.  An exhaustive list of their nondemocratic activities since taking office would probably consume more life space that either of us have remaining, so let’s limit ourselves to just a few:

Deploying National Guard troops on the streets of Los Angeles and Chicago over the objections of local authorities, seeking to deploy them in Portland, OR (again, over the objections of local authorities), and threatening New York and other cities whose citizens clearly oppose the Trump Regime.  (Add to that the Regime’s recent assemblage of all senior military officers, in which Mr. Trump’s vaguely referred to use of our active military in American cities.  This was arguably intended to intimidate reluctant officers; these men and women are understandably worried about their careers like everyone else.)   

Promiscuously employing ICE agents across the country.  The incidents of ICE agents’ overzealous and at times unwarranted actions are too numerous to mention.  I speculated in a post after Mr. Trump pardoned the January 6, 2021, insurrectionists that the pardoned Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers might provide the President his own private Sturmabteilung (the “SA”; Adolf Hitler’s Brownshirts, who terrorized Nazi opponents before he took power).  ICE is arguably edging toward being the Regime’s quasi-legal Sturmabteilung.  (ICE agents were recently walking the streets of Madison, WI.  Madison’s “illegal” Latino population cannot be significant by nationwide standards; however, since Madison is the heart of anti-Trump sentiment in swing state Wisconsin, the Administration was laying a predicate.)

Blowing up small boats in international waters.  There has been, of course, no evidence presented that any of these boats were carrying illegal drugs headed for the United States.  The notion that we are fighting a “war” which justifies American use of deadly force without adjudication is absurd. This is rogue nation murder.

The Administration’s recently-commenced prosecutions of former FBI Director James Comey and New York State Attorney General Letitia James by some pretty former lackey lawyer of Mr. Trump’s for alleged crimes that career federal prosecutors were unwilling to pursue.  The Regime isn’t trying to hide its attempt to seek retribution against its enemies; it is reveling in it.  That is the point.

We don’t need to go back over the inaction of gutless Congressional Republicans, the complicity of the Administration’s Supreme Court, the Regime’s attempt to intimidate powerful universities that oppose it, and MAGA-controlled state legislatures’ current mid-cycle redistricting efforts to stave off the Administration’s otherwise historically seemingly almost certain loss of control of the U.S. House of Representatives in January, 2026.

Given Mr. Trump’s obvious dictatorial inclinations, all of these could be predicted.  What I have found yet more instructive is Mr. Trump’s approach to the government shutdown.

In a post a few weeks ago, I asserted that forcing a government shutdown was an ill-conceived strategy for Democrats in their battle for public opinion because “… the next time that Americans ultimately blame a government shutdown on the party in power … will be the first time.”  If reported polls are accurate, I have so far been wrong (I bet you find that shocking 😊); Democrats have been holding their own.  Having been wrong has obviously never deterred me from offering further opinions, so I will venture this:  Democrats have found such support among a wide swath of the Americans not only because their position against skyrocketing health care premiums has “broken through” to the public but because Mr. Trump’s marginal 2024 voters – the ones that put him over the top – have become uneasy with the Administration’s autocratic excesses, not what they expected (despite Mr. Trump’s clear campaign rhetoric; we always have to give him that) or wanted.

Mr. Trump is the savviest reader and manipulator of public opinion in our generation.  He can read the polls.  Account after account in the media has indicated that the increase in Affordable Care Act premiums and loss of Medicaid benefits projected to be wrought by his markedly unpopular “Big Beautiful Bill (the ‘BBB’)” will disproportionately adversely impact his voters.  At the same time, he is so much better at messaging than the Democrats that on any day, he could sweep in, tell his lickspittle Congressional Republicans to support the legislative measures Democrats want, and claim that he brokered the peace.  He clearly can’t give a damn about any increase to our federal deficit resulting from the Democrats’ measure; even his staunchest supporters would have to concede that he doesn’t care about debt.  And a year from now, his gullible supporters won’t recall that their access to affordable health care was preserved by the Democrats’ stand. 

So why doesn’t he deal?

I would submit that it is because his priority is consolidation of power, not policy or even popularity within his base.  I’ll venture that he sees this as a pivotal moment; if Democrats are perceived – not among hardcore MAGAs, but among independents – to have scored a victory, he will be weakened when he has not yet fully taken control of the American populace.  He is out to crush the opposition at this moment, when his autocratic measures are confronting increasing discontent in a citizenry that for 250 years has been accustomed to think and speak for itself.

All who read these notes are aware that we regularly tune in to MSNBC’s Morning Joe, and that my inclinations frequently align with the show’s host, former U.S. FL Rep. Joe Scarborough.  That said, I have recently been raising an eyebrow at Mr. Scarborough’s observations about the ultimate political ramifications of the Trump Regime’s increasingly autocratic measures; his comments have frequently been in the vein, “What goes around comes around; they should be worried about the next time, when Democrats take control of the White House and Congress.”  My attitude is different, formed from the approach that I took toward negotiating commercial arrangements for almost 40 years:  assume that the other guy (in a genderless sense, of course 😉) is at least as bright as you are, and knows at least as much as you do.  So if s/he’s acting in a way that seems contrary to his/her interest, what does s/he know that you’re not factoring in?

I would suggest that the answer is straightforward, certainly supported by Regime actions during its first nine months seemingly contrary to its own political popularity:  MAGAs don’t intend to let it “come around,” or that there will be “a next time.”  To suggest otherwise defies what is right before our eyes.  Too many have spent too much of the last decade underestimating Donald Trump and the MAGA movement.     

The next federal midterm elections will be held on November 3, 2026, obviously just a little over a year distant.  When Mr. Trump was reelected, I thought that the struggle for the American way of life might be put off until the 2028 presidential election; now I think the upcoming election is the key.

Remember Sun Tzu.  While all demonstrations against the Regime must be peaceful – to do otherwise plays into its hands – don’t be subdued.  Hopefully, you will have the opportunity to participate in a NO KINGS rally today.  Although we have seen any number of truly witty signs over the last nine months, I plan to carry the ultimate symbol of protest and freedom – an American flag. 

Disparate Impressions

First, something I should have added to the recent post relating to the passing of former Wall Street Journal Personal Financial Columnist Jonathan Clements:  although Vanguard founder John Bogle, legendary investor Warren Buffett, and Mr. Clements all believe/ed that the American stock market would rise and individuals would reap satisfactory returns over the long run by investing in no-load, low-cost index funds tracking the markets, Mr. Buffett has famously said that he has no idea what the stock market will do tomorrow, and Messrs. Bogle and Clements would have undoubtedly agreed.  Accordingly, any funds one requires for an impending purchase should be safely harbored until spent in a federally-insured cash account.  There – my Irish Catholic conscience is clear (at least on this score 😉).       

It appears that President Donald Trump is brokering an end to the Israeli-Hamas conflict.  Whether any settlement will last – at the time this is typed, the shooting reportedly continues, and Middle Easterners have been warring for as close to forever as you can get in this finite existence – Mr. Trump may be achieving what I consider the most important immediate priority relating to the conflict:  ending the brutal slaughter of Palestinians, particularly children.  Although Israel’s activities were obviously precipitated by the Hamas attack, its response has been savagely disproportionate.  This is no reflection on the Israeli people, but on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who should be in an international jail for life.  Although I am not the first to say this, I acknowledge that Mr. Trump’s intervention was pivotal.  The “only Nixon could go to China” analogy is grossly overused, but it is accurate here.  The leaders of the cooperating Arab nations trust him because he thinks like they do.  Although the objective terms of the announced pact overwhelmingly favor Israel, Mr. Netanyahu could have suspended his military operation in Gaza long ago had he wished to do so.  When Mr. Trump pressured Mr. Netanyahu, as he reportedly did, to cease his military assault, Mr. Netanyahu was undoubtedly mindful that Mr. Trump was the only American president since the founding of Israel who could if he chose cut off aid to Israel and get away with it politically.      

Putting aside the moral dimensions and looking at the assassination of MAGA Activist Charlie Kirk in cold political terms, it is arguable that the only things that the deranged young man who assassinated Mr. Kirk achieved through his heinous act was to drive all reference to Mr. Trump’s relationship with convicted Child Trafficker Jeffrey Epstein – the one area in which Mr. Trump had seemingly been vulnerable with his MAGA base – out of the media consciousness, and to provide Mr. Trump and his MAGA minions a pretext upon which to more aggressively harass and stifle the free speech of Mr. Trump’s critics.

With the return of the NFL season, I have been spending more time with sports media.  This may just now be registering with me, but growing up in a family plagued by addiction – albeit a different one — I am appalled at the emphasis placed on gambling in these telecasts.  I have noted repeated ads by FanDuel, by DraftKings, by BetMGM, am aware that there are many other online betting organizations, and hear plenty of betting talk among the commentators.  So let’s take a bunch of immature, unmoored, desperate, mostly impecunious, mostly male young Americans and constantly wave the temptation to bet in their faces, make it easy to bet, make it look easy to win, and see what happens.  I have not read the 2018 Supreme Court decision that enabled widespread online sports gambling and concede that this decision is not the most injurious to the American way of life that the Court has or will issue, but that doesn’t mean that easy-does-it online sports betting hasn’t and won’t lead to the ruination of quite a few (disproportionately young) lives.

I am disgusted with justifications frequently put forth to defend those Congressional Republicans who allegedly deplore Mr. Trump’s policies – and him – behind closed doors, but through their subservience enable Administration activities.  Those seeking to rationalize these Republicans’ behaviors note that these officeholders fear being “primaried” by other MAGAs professing greater fealty to Mr. Trump, and/or that they fear literal physical retribution against themselves or their families if they don’t adhere to the MAGA line.  I don’t buy it.  These Republicans — if such do exist — are in the Congress of the United States.  Nobody made them run for Congress.  Under the Constitution, they each get a vote as to whether the United States should declare war on another nation – and if they so vote, thousands of military families, whether or not they agree with the declaration, will find loved ones in harm’s way.  So these gutless Republicans fear losing a seat in Congress?  As to the fear of physical retribution, they should, given the responsibility they have voluntarily chosen, be placing their own physical safety below that which they consider good for the nation and their constituents.  While all can sympathize with a member’s concern for the wellbeing of his/her family, my reaction here is:  send your family to live where they cannot be easily located by MAGA zealots while you finish out your term, announce that you are stepping down at the end of your term, and then do what you believe is right during the remainder of your term.  If you can’t do that, take the simpler approach, and resign right now.  Grow a … er … spine.  You’re not in high school, the frat, or the sorority any more.

Enough impressions for one note.  Nationwide NO KINGS rallies are scheduled for Saturday, October 18.  Judging by the national website, there will be one near you, no matter where you are.  If you plan to participate, anticipate that ICE or other Administration agents will establish a presence.  STAY PEACEFUL.  NEITHER PROVOKE, NOR BE PROVOKED.  In the meantime, enjoy the fall weekend upon us.

The Horns of a Dilemma

“It is an admirable dilemma.  I have rarely seen one with so many horns and all of them so sharp.”

  • The fictional detective Nero Wolfe; Rex Stout; Fer-de-Lance

As all who care are aware, President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin met on Friday in Alaska – without Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky – to discuss a resolution to the Russian-Ukrainian conflict precipitated by Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.  Mr. Trump went in declaring that his primary goal was to obtain a ceasefire; such was not obtained.  It was clear from the video of Mr. Trump’s fawning greeting to Putin that nothing positive would be achieved. When the meeting ended – with an uncharacteristic acknowledgement by Mr. Trump that he and Putin had failed to reach any agreement – I actually felt relief.  Since I had expected nothing good to come from the meeting, I initially considered it a victory that Mr. Trump seemingly hadn’t done anything to worsen the Ukrainian cause.

Silly me.  I understand that Mr. Trump has now, contrary to his position before the Alaska meeting and that of Ukraine and other NATO nations, abandoned his calls for a ceasefire – so Ukrainian civilians will continue to be killed by Russian missiles – and is instead seeking to persuade Mr. Zelensky to agree to Putin’s demands for Ukraine to cede certain Ukrainian territory to Russia — including some territory Russia doesn’t now even militarily control – in return for Putin’s written promise not to attack Ukraine or any European country again.  Such is absurd.  Not even the most gullible MAGA – save the President himself – would believe Putin’s promises.

Although I may be grasping at straws, the only heartening report I have heard about recent developments is that at least NATO and European leaders, who obviously understand the precariousness of the situation not only for Ukraine but for their own nations if Mr. Trump capitulates to Putin, are going to join Mr. Zelensky in Washington today as he meets with Mr. Trump.  It will be psychologically much more difficult for Mr. Trump – who, like any bully, shrinks from conflict when he does not have overwhelming advantage – to abandon Mr. Zelensky and Ukraine in the face of united European opposition.

We all know what should happen to resolve the conflict.  (Well, what should happen from a pragmatic standpoint.   What should happen from a moral standpoint is that Putin and his cohort spend the rest of their lives in an international prison for war crimes, with Russia paying reparations to the families of those killed or injured through Russian aggression and for the restoration of Ukrainian infrastructure.)  You are familiar enough with the map of conflict that a depiction need not be displayed here (even if I had the technological acumen to do so 😉 ).  I would suggest that from a practical perspective, the following components might form the basis for a settlement (I’m undoubtedly missing a number; feel free to comment):

  • Russia keeps the Ukrainian territory it currently controls, and Ukraine recognizes these lands, Crimea and the other Ukrainian territory taken by Russia in 2014, as Russian territory.
  • Russia recognizes Ukrainian sovereignty and renounces all claim to Ukrainian territory not within the territories ceded to the Russians.
  • All Ukrainians (particularly including children) and all prisoners of war on both sides are immediately exchanged.
  • Establishment of a border zone similar that maintained by Finland and the Baltic States on their Russian borders, to be initially policed by a United Nations peacekeepers.
  • For a period of one year following the date of the settlement, any residents of the conceded-Russian territories who wish to move to Ukraine can freely do so; any residents living in the Ukrainian territory recognized by Russia that wish to move to Russia can freely do so.  The ability for such residents to freely elect such a choice is also to be monitored by the UN.
  • Ukraine is granted immediate admission to NATO and to the European Union, with it thereby assuming all the responsibilities and receiving all the security guarantees of every other NATO member.  It is specifically declared that any attempt by Russia to hinder Ukraine’s access to the Black Sea will be considered an offensive action against NATO.
  • The U.S. and the E.U. agree to lift their sanctions against Russia.
  • Russia and Ukraine release all claims for reparations against the other.      

The above can be achieved – and can only be achieved – through American as well as European dedication of the military and financial support to Ukraine sufficient to convince Putin that his brutal invasion has no greater hope of success than that he has already achieved.  Obviously, such American dedication will not occur while Mr. Trump is President of the United States.  I understand why the European leaders feel they have no choice but to coddle and placate this man in order to protect Western democracies and their own people, but it turns my stomach to watch, and suspect that it makes some of them privately want to vomit.   

[An aside:  I don’t know why leading Democrats aren’t denouncing any capitulation by Mr. Trump to Putin with a simple message:  “If Ukraine falls, it will be Trump who lost Ukraine.”  Repeating endlessly:  “It will be Trump who lost Ukraine.”  That is the kind of message that “breaks through” in the public consciousness that MAGAs are great at, and that Democrats (there is no kinder way to put it) suck at.  (I’d normally like to see former President Barack Obama make the case, but since he took no meaningful action when Putin took Crimea in 2014, Mr. Obama is, let’s say, a wee bit out of position.)]  

From the time Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 until the present – from the day Mr. Zelensky responded to an offer of safe passage for him and his family out of his country with the reply – apocryphal or not — “The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride” – the defense of Ukraine has rested on his shoulders, on his steadfastness.  Anyone with any sense has realized that given his people’s sacrifices, while the struggle continues Mr. Zelensky cannot signal any willingness to give any concessions to the Russians unless Ukraine – what remains of it – is admitted to NATO; if he did, his people’s morale would collapse.  Any lesser security guarantee is worthless.  (I’m aware that U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff said over the weekend, “The United States is potentially prepared to be able to give Article 5 security guarantees, but not from NATO — directly from the United States and other European countries.”  Mr. Witkoff’s representation sounds good; but recall that in the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Russia agreed that if Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons – which it did – they would respect Ukraine’s independence, sovereignty, and existing borders, and refrain from the use of force against Ukraine.  With that history, is it reasonable for Mr. Zelensky to trust any security assurances he receives that leave Ukraine outside the parameters of the NATO alliance?  Would you?)

I see an approaching dilemma for Mr. Zelensky:  Mr. Trump will seize upon any concession made by Putin as a way to claim a public relations triumph.  Mr. Zelensky will recognize that Putin’s empty gesture affords no safeguards for his nation, and that any agreement to it by Ukraine will inevitably result in Russia’s annexation of Ukraine.  At the same time, Mr. Zelensky will also recognize that offending Mr. Trump – for example, expressing doubt that Mr. Trump, no matter what he says now, will commit American forces to defend Ukraine if Russia reinstitutes hostilities — will almost certainly cause Mr. Trump to blame Ukraine for the continuation of hostilities and angrily withdraw American aid from Ukraine.  Most military observers opine that any such withdrawal — no matter how robust the assistance of the European NATO nations – will ultimately enable Russia, through its continued inexorable brutal slaughter of Ukraine’s civilians and soldiers, to annex Ukraine.

I suspect that Mr. Zelensky’s and his aides’ response to any empty offer by Putin will be similar to that expressed by Winston Churchill in May, 1940, as Britain faced the Nazi Wehrmacht alone:  “[L]et it end only when each of us lies choking in his own blood upon the ground.”  That said, on that occasion Mr. Churchill wasn’t addressing the British people, but other government officials.  Does one knowingly sentence thousands more of one’s own people, including thousands of children, to die in what will appear a hopeless battle?   

I can think of no dilemma with horns as sharp as that which Mr. Zelensky and his advisors could soon be confronting.

We’ll see what happens.  Let us pray for the best.

Focusing My Antipathy

It might appear from your side of the screen that I have contributed little to these pages in recent months, but not from this side.  My document store is cluttered with any number of posts begun but abandoned. My reticence has arisen from the realization that my antipathy for Mr. Trump’s behavior has so colored my perspective on our political dynamic that figuratively standing back a bit to attempt to maintain a broader perspective has been the appropriate approach for me.  I literally fast forward by his comments and those of his spokespeople whenever they come up on TV.  I don’t believe a word they have to say.

To what do I attribute my deep emotions regarding the President’s actions?  It is not his policy choices.  Make no mistake:  I consider Mr. Trump’s and his MAGA Administration’s approaches on taxes, tariffs, Medicaid, the budget deficit and the federal debt, the environment, science, education, NATO, Ukraine/Russia specifically, immigration — and probably ten other issues we could name if we took a minute — to be substantively idiotic.  But perhaps because of my legal training, I don’t take substantive differences to heart, so Mr. Trump’s substantive positions, as sad and counterproductive to our nation’s long-term wellbeing as they are, warrant vigorous debate but don’t strike a visceral cord within me.

What I find distressing is that Mr. Trump’s abhorrent past actions are seemingly fading from the collective American consciousness – like they never happened.  He’s lied them away.

They haven’t faded for me. 

I trace my visceral feelings about his behaviors to these instances:

His traitorous behavior.  He lied, and continues to deny, his loss in the 2020 presidential election.  With millions of dollars at his disposal, he lost about 60 lawsuits in swing states challenging former President Joe Biden’s victory.  That election was unquestionably close; but to use a trite sports analogy, during the World Series they have about six cameras covering first base from every angle.  If the 2020 election is imagined as Mr. Trump running down the first base line, all six cameras would have shown that the ball hit the first baseman’s glove just before Mr. Trump’s foot hit the bag.  He was out.  It was close, but he was out.  His unwillingness to admit it to this day has groundlessly and execrably undermined the Americans’ confidence in our voting processes, the foundation of our system of government.  The fact that anybody with a lick of sense should have been able to see through his lies – and millions haven’t – doesn’t excuse his behavior.

His incitement of an insurrection.  You saw his speech on January 6, 2021.  You saw the result.  Calling it a lovefest doesn’t make it one.  The attack on the Capitol was an insurrection – an attempted coup – which came within a hair’s breadth of succeeding.  Mr. Trump should be in jail, not in the White House.  Ditto the comment above regarding anybody with a lick of sense.

His dictatorial behavior.  Some of our most renowned presidents have exercised broad presidential power, some skating to or over the limits of presidential power drawn in the Constitution.  That said, as far as I’m aware, of our presidents only Mr. Trump – save perhaps President Abraham Lincoln, who had ample reason to call out southern secessionists – has referred to other Americans as “Enemies of the People” – a phrase used by Nazi Propagandist Joseph Goebbels against the Jews, Russian Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin during his Great Purge, and Chinese Chairman Mao Zedong during his Cultural Revolution.

His demonization of immigrants – at least immigrants of color.  It obviously started with his 2015 trip down the escalator, calling Latin Americans “murders and rapists,” continued throughout his first term, further continued during the 2024 campaign with his reference to them as “vermin” – an epithet Adolf Hitler used about those he considered undesirable – and now with his Administration’s indiscriminate, terrorizing deportation activities.  Undocumented immigrants are indeed criminals – they have entered the country in violation of our immigration laws, no matter how law abiding they’ve been since crossing our border — and what we do about them is a policy issue.  But dehumanizing them for doing what anyone with courage should be willing to do if necessary to ensure a better life for his/her family — in practical terms what the forebears of every American citizen save Native Americans and those brought here in chains did do — is a malign act.

His bullying, self-dealing, and dividing Americans – in some cases, dividing families — for his own political gain.  His actions in these regards are so well settled that, as lawyers sometimes say, they need no citation.

You could add others; I have limited my list to actions for which there is no reasonable doubt. 

All that said, I have come to view Mr. Trump as a personal spiritual as well as temporal challenge.  Throughout this note, I’ve referred to my antipathy for Mr. Trump’s actions.  The very word, “antipathy,” is obviously a softer, ten-cent synonym for more provocative alternatives. In my faith, and I suspect in many faiths, we are taught that one can “hate the sin, not the sinner”; every day, millions of Christians ask the Almighty to “forgive our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us” — which one could argue amounts to those of less forgiving nature rotely giving a merciful God license to judge them more harshly than He (excuse the male pronoun for a genderless being) otherwise might.  I don’t believe that I can wish ill upon another.  Former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi, a fellow Catholic, has said that she prays for Mr. Trump; he has mocked her for it.  (I must sheepishly admit that Ms. Pelosi has greater faith than I do; although all things are possible with God, unless we can get Mr. Trump on a horse on the road to Damascus, I see little prospect that he will change his ways.  😉 )  I can’t claim to have said many prayers for the President, but I am focusing my antipathy on his behaviors. 

For the sake of my soul, as I fast forward by his lies, rants and inanities, I hope I’m succeeding.

We’ll soon get back to regular programming. Stay well. 🙂